


Sonata

by IMAgentMI



Category: Red vs. Blue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-07
Updated: 2018-11-07
Packaged: 2019-08-20 05:04:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16549448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IMAgentMI/pseuds/IMAgentMI
Summary: York retreats to his quarters when his eyes become too painful, to play guitar in the dark.  Unbeknownst to him, his friends gather next door to listen.





	Sonata

“Have I missed anything?”  
“No, he just started.”

Wash walked in, nodded to his teammates that had already gathered. He sat on North’s bed, and scooted as close as he could to the wall, being careful not to bump against it. The music that traveled faintly from York’s quarters began to grow in volume. As it became louder, the whispering in the room quieted and the assembled Freelancers became still. Wyoming was leaning against the wall, a glass of wine held lazily in his hand. “Terrega, Etude in E Minor,” he murmured to the room in general, before raising his glass to his lips. He paused for a moment, closed his eyes, brow furrowed. “Something’s gone flat.” On cue, the music stopped, and there was a quiet note plucked over and over while York re-tuned. When the music began again, Wyoming gave a satisfied nod and finally took a sip.

North handed Wash a glass and sat down on the edge of the bed. A collection of mismatched stemware and tumblers had accumulated in North’s room expressly for these evenings. No one knew where they came from, nor how North seemed to produce a bottle of wine at a moment’s notice without fail. But he did, and all the Freelancers present had their own glass, wine carefully rationed so there was enough to go around, even if on more crowded nights it was little more than a few sips each. Wash bent closer as North leaned toward him to whisper, “This is the third in just over a week.” Wash nodded silently in response and felt something tighten in his chest. It was becoming easier to predict the days that they would be meeting here, covertly listening to the concert that York unwittingly provided. He played on the days when his head ached, when his jokes and laughter died away, and he used that brittle smile that he thought kept people from knowing he was in pain. He played the days when his bad eye and his good became so strained that he retreated to his room to play guitar in the dark. 

As he sipped his wine, Wash looked around the room, taking in his teammates’ reactions as they listened. Florida and CT sat next to each other on the floor. Florida’s eyes were unfocused, gazing through the wall ahead of him, lost in his own thoughts. CT had her arms wrapped around her knees. She looked at ease in a way Wash hadn’t seen in a long time, like the Connie he used to know, with her features relaxed, softened into a smile, and a quiet joy shone in her eyes. Carolina sat in a chair turned sideways against the wall. Her head was bowed, and she held her wineglass between her knees while she listened. Her eyes were tight and troubled - Wash had no doubt that she realized the significance of these frequent performances as well. Wyoming was attentive, gesturing with his wineglass occasionally, nodding with approval, sometimes commenting under his breath, giving the impression of an one sided conversation with the musician behind the wall. He broke out of his own little world to speak to his teammates only to identify the composer and the piece being played - Wash couldn’t remember if there had ever been one that Wyoming didn’t know. 

The song ended, and with barely a pause York launched into the next, gentle and sweet. Wyoming smiled - “Bach, Cello Suite number one - probably just the prelude again.” Wash nodded to himself - York played this one frequently, and while Wash knew next to nothing about classical music, it was becoming one of his favourites. It had a lightness that seemed to shake off the weight and anxiety of their work, and for the first time all day, he breathed easy. On the floor, CT closed her eyes, and her head tilted back ever so slightly, as though expecting a kiss. Even Carolina looked up, eyes soft, before leaning against the wall to hear better.

By the time the third piece started, everyone was settled in, broken away from the world outside this small room. Wash didn’t think he knew this one, but when Wyoming announced “Terrega, Adelita” softly to the room, he saw his teammates nodding in recognition. Maybe he missed a few - for a while, before they started to recognize the warning signs, the people who gathered were just the ones that North could find close to his quarters. They didn’t dare rush about in a way that might draw attention, so those early meetings had included no more than a couple people. The first time he’d been walking by and North had reached out and snagged him, half-dragging him inside, Wash didn’t understand what was going on, or what he was hearing. He’d stood side by side with North and Carolina, staring at the wall, and when it finally all clicked he nearly gave the game away when he hissed “that’s York??” He ended up listening to the rest of that song held in a headlock by Carolina, with North’s hand clamped over his mouth. 

Carolina was the only one who had been aware that York could play. Over the course of that first evening, she told them how he’d learned to play long before Freelancer, back when he first had started learning how to pick locks, in order to help keep his fingers limber. She had seen the guitar before in his room and asked him about it, but that was all he was willing to tell her, aside from joking that he’d flipped a coin between guitar or knitting. When she asked if he would play something for her, he gently declined, and changed the subject. The next time she visited, the case was nowhere in sight. She had thought that he was afraid to play poorly with someone listening - but she had no explanation for this. Later, Wyoming insisted that there was no way that York was self-taught - he was convinced that he must have studied under a master and had a list of reasons as long as his arm on why it must be so. No one else seemed to believe it, but the other Freelancers now carefully avoided the subject, to keep from setting off another long-winded lecture. 

So it remained a mystery, one that could only be solved by asking York outright, with little hope of getting a straight answer while almost certainly blowing their cover. They all suspected that if it ever came to his attention that they were huddled the next room over with their smuggled wine and stolen moments of beauty, the concerts would come to an abrupt end. 

There was another pause, and when the next piece started, Wyoming’s eyes widened. “Albeniz, Asturias.” He pressed his lips to his glass, but Wash still heard him whisper “brave choice.” A moment later, he understood why. 

Wash was distantly aware of his fingers gripping the blanket beneath him on the bed. Even from a separate room, the music seemed to flood through them with a terrible urgency. It built around them, hungry and alive, and Wash felt his throat tighten. On the floor, Connie and Florida leaned against each other, seeking comfort in contact. Wash couldn’t understand how only one set of hands could play so many notes at once. Wyoming bent his head as though in prayer, and behind him Carolina wrapped her arms around herself, tucking her chin down to her chest. It built like an ache, a wave of desperate human need - visceral, haunting and consuming. Then- 

It stopped.

On the bed next to him, Wash saw North give a start out of the corner of his eye, and they turned to look at each other. The other Freelancers were equally shocked. In the silent confusion, Connie stood, and they all turned to the door, wondering if there would be a knock at any moment. But from his position next to the wall, Wash heard a deep sigh from the other room - by their faces, Carolina and Wyoming heard it too. A moment later, music started again, but this time soft and slow.

“Beethoven, Moonlight Sonata.” No one needed Wyoming for this one, they all knew it. A new wave of uneasiness swept over the group. York played this as the very last song every time, a favourite lullaby to himself before putting away the guitar and turning in for the night. But never this soon. 

“He's probably just tired.” North's voice was light, but his eyes were full of concern that was mirrored in his teammates’ faces. 

“It's his eyes,” said Carolina bluntly, “ and we all know it,” Just like that, everything they were trying to avoid was laid out, impossible to ignore. York was struggling with a loss that couldn’t be fixed, couldn’t be replaced, and the strain was obvious, even when no one wanted to acknowledge it. York was still high on the leaderboard for now, but how much longer could a one-eyed soldier survive on the battlefield, when the chips were down? There had been a couple friendly-fire incidents on the sim floor, when a teammate suddenly appeared on his blind side, catching him by surprise. When he was out of the familiar confines of the MOI, when he couldn't rely on knowing every square inch of the training room, or the sim floor - he might be both a danger and a liability. They couldn't always be there to watch his blind side, couldn’t always avoid it. Best case scenario, he drops on the leaderboard, sliding out of top rankings, the top team, and maybe out of the program entirely, forced into a retirement, that no other Freelancer had yet managed to reach. Worst case, his body would be hauled in from the field, only so his armour could be retrieved and then handed over to a new recruit who had better have the sense to repaint it before any of York's teammates saw.

“He’s been okay so far. With the Sarcophagus -” Florida began.

“He’s been lucky,” Wyoming corrected. There was a lot of shifting in the room as the soldiers found they couldn’t ignore this either. It was all just a matter of time. And through it all, the guitar played soft and lulling in the background.

In the face of all these ugly truths, Wash found that these meetings, these well-meaning betrayals of trust were beginning to weigh on his conscience. “Maybe we should just tell him we’re here. Maybe we should stop doing this.” The other Freelancers looked relieved at the change of subject.

“No.” Surprisingly, it was Carolina who spoke up the quickest. 

“Why not?” 

She didn’t answer.

“We all know he has kept this quiet, that he doesn’t want to talk about it. We don’t know why, but he doesn’t. We are going directly against that.” Wash realized he was starting to raise his voice, and caught a warning look from North. 

“I know.”

“Then why do we do this?”

“Because it deserves to be appreciated. He deserves to be remembered as something more than a soldier.” Heads all turned toward Wyoming, but he turned his gaze upwards and refused to meet their eyes. The ugly truths they wanted to avoid stared them back down.

“So that’s it then.” North’s face was as bleak as his voice. “We just sit here and listen to him perform at his own wake, before he’s even dead.” No one had an answer for that. They sat in silence, listening as York played on. No one spoke when the last notes drifted away, and they heard the snaps of the guitar case, the creak of the mattress as he pulled himself into bed. Eventually North stood, they all stood, and raised their glasses in the silent salute they offered every night in lieu of applause. Wash focused on his glass, unwilling to see the somber looks on the faces of his friends. Together they drank, then one by one, they set their empty glasses on North’s desk. North saw them out, standing in the doorway and handing out hugs as his friends left, even kissing the top of CT’s head, receiving a tiny muffled laugh in response. Wash was the last to leave, and was surprised when North closed the door to his room and followed him. Together they walked to Wash’s quarters in silence, but once Wash pulled the door shut behind them, North didn’t waste time. “There has to be something we can do.”

Wash looked up at him in surprise. “You’ve known him a lot longer than I have. Can you think of anything he won’t laugh off, or pretend he didn’t hear, or flat out tell us it’s none of our business? Because if I could,” Wash gestured towards the door, “I’d be in his room right now saying it.” When North didn’t answer, Wash started to pace. North dropped heavily into Wash’s only chair, folded his arms and bowed his head. Silence dragged on for ten minutes and more, as both men thought feverishly. Finally Wash came to a stop, and North looked up. Their eyes met reluctantly. Nothing.

North sighed, one hand coming up to cover his eyes. “Maybe we still have some time. He’s still high on the leaderboard. If this first AI works well with Maine, York might get one.”

“Do you think that would help? Is an AI enough of an advantage to counter having only one eye?”

North shrugged. “You know as much as I do. And we still don’t know if the next is supposed to go to Carolina or not, since she gave hers up for Maine, but…” North dropped his hand to glance at Wash, but Wash only shrugged. “But maybe York will be up next. Or soon.” 

“If the Director doesn’t think it is a waste of resources to give an AI to a one-eyed soldier.” Wash tried to keep the skepticism out of his voice, but failed.

“Yeah.” North’s eyes were looking decidedly red-rimmed, but he kept reaching for hope. “Still, he’s our infiltration specialist and we don’t have anyone near his calibre to replace him. That has to work in his favour. Right?” 

Again, Wash wasn’t sure why North was asking him, of all people. “I guess. Maybe.” 

“So now what? Do we keep doing this? Or just call it off?”

It took Wash a couple seconds to realize what he meant. “These meetups? The ‘concerts’?” Wash stared through the floor, chewing his lip as he thought. “Me personally, I say we keep doing them.”

“But you said -”

“I know.” Wash felt a headache rising behind his eyes. “I know, and while I don't like parts of this, if York… if he…” Wash brought up his hand in a helpless gesture, unwilling to finish the sentence. “Wyoming's right. He deserves to be remembered as something more than just a soldier. And if this is time we can spend with him, even if he doesn't know it...well, I think I would regret it more if we didn't, more than I would if we did.” 

“Yeah.” North stood. “That’s how I feel. But I thought maybe I was just being selfish.”

“Maybe we are. I want to do it anyway. Ultimately we’d be the ones living with it, not him.”

North winced. “That’s…” 

“True.”

“I was going to say dark.”

“It’s still true.”

Wash walked North to the door, and they stood there for a moment. North seemed unwilling to go on that note, but his next words didn’t exactly lighten the mood. “Wash, if it was you, how would you want to be remembered?” 

It wasn’t something that Wash really wanted to think about right now. “I’m planning on living forever, so it shouldn’t be an issue. You?”

North grinned. “I just want people to remember how devilishly handsome I was.”

Wash snorted. “You have about as much chance of that as York does.” North laughed at that, and even if it was a bit forced, it was still good to hear after everything that had taken place tonight. 

North placed his hand on Wash’s shoulder. From anyone else, the gesture would have seemed patronizing, but from North it was just comforting. By the look on his face, North desperately wanted to say what they both wanted to hear, that something would be figured out, that everything would be okay… but if he did, neither of them would believe it. 

It was still comforting anyway.

Neither said goodbye. North turned and started off down the hall. Wash watched him for a moment, then closed the door, sat down on his bed and pulled off his shoes with a little more force than was necessary. He flopped backwards, tucked his hands behind his head and stared up at the ceiling, listening to the music that still played in his head.

**Author's Note:**

> If you want to enjoy York's concert along with the other Freelancers, you can find the playlist here:
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzq0-z7tfuwPzi01x9iuKN7SKSfZZvIYX
> 
> Enjoy.


End file.
